


When You Know It Has to End

by SunTheater



Category: The Boyz (Korea Band)
Genre: + more info on that in first A/N, Alternate Universe - Orchestra, Choi Chanhee | New-centric, Implied Sexual Content, M/M, chanhee being a massive taurus, mentions of workplace sexual harassment, mild drinking, not the healthiest relationship with work/art, slow burn kind of??, some angst hhhhh, tbz are classical musicians :D, weirdly-paced burn
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2021-03-09
Updated: 2021-03-13
Packaged: 2021-03-16 07:35:19
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 3
Words: 18,520
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29946630
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/SunTheater/pseuds/SunTheater
Summary: Just like every other night, with hands cold to the point of aching and eyes too dry to keep open, he plays.He plays the same movement over and over again, then plays the same measure over and over again. He stands in his living room in a giant old tee shirt and house slippers and gives himself away to his violin until he can’t bear to stand any longer.It’s late. His shoulders ache sweetly, full of sugar, and he can’t sleep.~Chanhee's music is his top priority, the axis of his life and his greatest love. So when he's given the chance to realize his childhood dream and advance his position in the orchestra, he can't afford any distractions. Distractions like a certain coworker who isn't shy about his feelings and has the most beautiful violin Chanhee's ever seen.Yes, his music is his top priority, and he'll do what he can to keep Jaehyun off the list.
Relationships: Bae Joonyoung | Jacob/Kim Sunwoo, Choi Chanhee | New/Lee Jaehyun | Hyunjae, Ji Changmin | Q/Son Youngjae | Eric, Minor or Background Relationship(s)
Comments: 18
Kudos: 31





	1. Prelude

**Author's Note:**

> Hi, deobi, you look lovely today <3 This is a REALLY long first A/N because I'm feeling chatty and want to explain some things. Feel free to skim/skip. I love you ^-^
> 
> First and most importantly, this work has a theme of workplace sexual harassment in one of its minor arcs. It's only ever mentioned, there's never a scene detailing it explicitly, and it's never anything physical. It is first mentioned in the first chapter and comes up occasionally throughout the first half of the work. The harasser is not at all based on any kpop personality, it's a made-up character. Please take care of yourself if any of that will be bad for you and decide whether or not to read accordingly.
> 
> Second, I knew next to nothing about classical music when I got this idea, so if you're a big classical fan, bear with me. If you wanna drop me some recommendations of things to listen to, I will 100% love you forever.
> 
> Also, this is another piece of mine set it Ambiguous City, Wherever, which means still no honorifics lmao. Maybe deobi will get a 'hyung' out of me someday *wistful sigh*
> 
> Title and also the inspiration for this piece in general comes from Bring Me The Horizon's "i don't know what to say"

The final note rings out through the concert hall, striking like an arrow, and Chanhee settles back to possess his body again.

He tries to relax, but his arms still ache with that familiar dull tension and his heart pounds in time with the now-absent music. Without it there, his body starts running to an erratic rhythm, always caught off guard at having to play itself once the sheet music ends.

The conductor launches into her usual spiel, and he does what he can to absorb it while gathering his things. Catches Younghoon’s eyes across the stage and smiles when he cocks his head to the side in the puppy way he does.

After a solid twenty minutes of Taeyeon running through her list of mental notes, slowly working herself up to near-hysteria over their sluggish progress (something Chanhee has years of personal experience with), they all filter back to the labyrinth of the concert hall’s inner workings. Most leave quickly, go back to their wives and their kids and their hobbies.

Like always, Chanhee sticks around.

“Chanhee!”

He knows that voice like the curve of his instrument, recognizes it like an itch under his skin. “Eric.”

He beams, smiles like a lighthouse every time someone says his name. No matter the tone, Eric is always happy to be seen, heard, and discussed. “Drinks tonight.”

“It’s a Tuesday.”

“Perfect day to hit up the bar.”

“Nope. Absolutely not.”

“ _ Yes _ , absolutely yes,” he counters, waving at Haknyeon hauling his bass to the wings. Refocusing on Chanhee, he adds, “Everyone’s coming out.”

“Not everyone,” he laughs, shaking his head. “I’m going to work on the second movement for another hour or so. Maybe two. And then I’m gonna go home and go to sleep.”

Eric gets the same look on his face he always does before he complains about the way Chanhee does  _ everything _ . “That’s, what, 6 PM? That’s the saddest plan I’ve ever heard.”

“Thanks.” Finishes with the clasps on his case and sidesteps Eric to go get his coat. But of course, he follows.

“I think you should come have fun with your friends for once.”

“We hang out all the time.”

“At  _ work _ .”

“Work is exactly what I’m doing the rest of the time anyway, so try to think of it like you’re spending all my free time with me.” He punctuates it with a sweet if not condescending smile (his patience only stretches so far where Eric is concerned) and pushes forward.

“Hey, come on, please?”

_ God _ , he’s insufferable. Ambitious and clever and just the right amount of shameless to get the job done.

It would be so much easier to say no if Eric would keep his lonely kid voice out of the fray. If he could let Chanhee forget he’s fresh out of school and much lighter on friends than he had been just a few months before accepting his position here. Of course, Chanhee isn’t his  _ only _ friend; Eric is a social butterfly who just happens to be between habitats. But that small quality he can add when he’s begging, his secret weapon, it makes Chanhee feel like he is.

Of course, he knows this.

Sighing, making sure Eric can see how his eyes roll all the way back in his skull, he caves. “Fine.  _ One _ drink. But I’m probably gonna be the first to leave.”

He springs back immediately. “Yes, awesome! Okay, we’re gonna head over in a while here. If you want, you can meet us around six? Unless that’s too close to your bedtime,” he teases.

Chanhee is blessed with a vision of himself stomping on Eric’s foot in his nice boots, the heavy ones that make his footsteps sound like the president’s. “Mhmm, save it. I’ll meet you over there in a bit.”

Eric nods and starts to run off, but Chanhee catches him. “Wait, who all is coming?”

“Uh, I think it’s me, you, Jacob, Kevin, and Sangyeon? Maybe Sunwoo, but I haven’t talked to him since Saturday, so-”

“That’s fine, thank you.”

It takes Eric a moment to catch up, but soon his face crushes together in a laugh, and Chanhee takes that as his opportunity to leave. No reason to stick around now for Eric to mock him when there’s likely to be so much of it later tonight.

Almost everyone has cleared out by the time he makes his way to the back closet, but there are still a few stragglers. No one he’s too close with, a relief since he now has to go out and spend even more time with people than he had planned on. Quick in-and-out, no conversation. He’ll go home and change, spend some time with friends (but not too much), head home and get some more practice in before he starts winding down-

“Hey, Chanhee.”

Seems nothing is easy today.

He tries to mask his disappointment at being caught and says, “Hi, Jaehyun.” Keeps it simple, nothing to invite any further conversation.

If he were lucky, that would be it.

“Good rehearsal. Except Taeyeon’s notes at the end, of course,” he says with a laugh. Jaehyun is always laughing at something, never anything funny. “Always more work.”

“Yeah,” he nods.

“You’re leaving a bit earlier today. Plans tonight?”

It’s obviously just empty small talk; Jaehyun doesn’t even look at him when he asks. “Just gonna go out with some friends. If I’m lucky, I’ll be back at my place by eight.”

The soft click of the clasps on Jaehyun’s case, the gentle tap of him setting it on the old wood floors. He turns and looks at Chanhee, smiles politely but not genuinely. “Well I hope you have fun.” For a second, it almost seems like he has more to say, but it’s hidden behind that same blank slate smile. Always is, with him.

“Thanks.” They sit with the silence while Chanhee pulls on his coat, and it’s built to an uncomfortable crescendo by the time he says, “Have a good night, Jaehyun.” Waves but doesn’t wait for Jaehyun to wave back.

He takes the train home, mulls over what the conductor left them with at the end of rehearsal. Traces the outlines of the houndstooth pattern on his case and considers buying a wooden one for the millionth time. This one is pretty, keeps everything together. But there’s something romantic about a classic wooden case, something nostalgic in the feel of it under his fingertips.

And no matter how much he tells himself it’s not the most important thing, not the part of music he should be chasing, he wants that romance. He wants the aesthetic feelings of being what he is. Wants velvet and gold and fine Italian wood. He wants the best.

But earning the best would mean never going out for drinks with friends, not even when he wanted to.

He changes into something nice but not too nice, warmer than what he wore to rehearsal. Something easy to pull off and toss in a basket the second he gets home. He gives in to the tiny part of him that’s been missing the feeling of wasted time and goes to meet his friends.

~

It’s a bit loud, gets louder as the night draws on, and not in the way he’s used to. It’s disjointed. Cacophonous. Probably a few other words he had to learn as vocabulary in high school and has since forgotten. Crowded too, and he’s not planning to get drunk enough to feel entirely comfortable. Still, something about it is warm.

“Hey, Sunwoo! Finally decided to show up?” Eric calls, just over the line of tipsy, probably about as far gone as Chanhee will let himself get by the end of tonight. He’s never been able to keep up with Eric.

Sunwoo  _ is _ late. The rest of them convinced Chanhee to stay a bit longer an hour ago; they had all assumed he wasn’t going to show.

“Sorry, I had to take care of something.”

“Ooh, mysterious,” Jacob jokes. Chanhee doesn’t miss the way Sunwoo ducks his head for just a moment, presses his lips together against a smile. Knows it was probably just some family thing; he’s always dropping in to help them out with odd jobs. Nothing exotic, but he knows Sunwoo secretly likes the interest it inspires.

They fold him in seamlessly, as if he had been there from the start. Chanhee sits back in the long booth they’ve crowded into and lets himself take it in passively. The sound of easy conversation, the smell of alcohol, neither one too overwhelming.

The scene as it is: Eric, Jacob, Sangyeon, and Sunwoo talking animatedly about some movie, and Kevin hunched over his glass, glancing up on occasion and pretending to follow along.

“Kev,” he says, tapping the back of his forearm where it lies on the tabletop. Waits for him to look up before he asks, “Talk at the bar?” Discrete, even though Kevin’s never been one to keep too many secrets.

He looks confused but nods anyway, slides out of the end of the booth. The others barely even wave as they slink away together.

They’ve barely even settled into a space against the bar when he asks, “Okay, so what’s up?”

“Huh?” Kevin asks.

“You’re off tonight. Something wrong?”

He smiles and opens his mouth to answer, but Chanhee isn’t having it. “No lying. If you’re not fine, I wanna know.”

His sunny, empty reassurance smile drops and he nods. His lips pull into a tight grimace and he explains, “It’s just him again.”

“ _ God _ , what did he do today? Are you okay?”

Kevin pretends he’s fine; it’s who he is. Chanhee coaxes him towards anger over what he deserves to be angry about; it’s who he’s decided to be for his friend. So it almost feels like progress when Kevin answers, voice thick with contempt, “Today it was about how the harp looks between my legs and how he’d like to-”

“God, he’s disgusting.” He takes a moment and forces his fists to relax at his sides, wills his ears to cool and his jaw to unclench. “Kevin, you have to file a complaint. Report him.”

“I… Chanhee, I just don’t know-”

“It’s either that or we get Sangyeon to beat the shit out of him. You know he’d do it. This has been going on for too long.”

Kevin sighs and catches Chanhee’s eyes. “There’s just… so much red tape. So many hoops to jump through. And what if it pisses them off and they let me go? He’s concertmaster. Not exactly someone they’d be too happy to discipline.”

It’s hard to see Kevin sad. Hard to see him upset or disappointed. But it’s so much worse to see him defeated. “If you file something against him and they blacklist  _ you _ , I will personally leave. I will leave.”

“You couldn’t.”

“I would.” He hopes Kevin can see he’s deadly serious. Hopes that, over the noise of the bar and the lethargy from rehearsal, Kevin can see he deserves better.

He pauses (far too long for Chanhee’s taste) and mutters, “I’ll think about it.”

“If he ever lays a hand on you, I  _ will _ kill him.”

“Whoa, okay, mobster,” he jokes. Looks back to the booth and takes another sip of his drink. “I… was that all? Should we head back?”

It’s not a satisfying ending. Nothing’s changed. For all Chanhee knows, the very next time they have rehearsal, Beomseok will go back to harassing Kevin, and he’ll continue to shoulder it like he always has. But, “Sure. Yeah, let’s just head back.”

For now, Kevin should relax. Should spend time with friends and drink and forget about the thorn in his side every time he steps into the building he’s dreamed of his entire life.

Of course,  _ Chanhee’s _ life only gets harder once they rejoin the group.

“There they are,” Sangyeon greets. “What was up?”

“Girl talk,” he deadpans. It gets them laughing, but that doesn’t mean it was funny. They’re a touch drunker than they usually are when he tries to joke.

“Ooh, I have girl talk,” Eric starts. Chanhee groans and rolls his eyes as a natural reflex. Any time Eric starts a sentence like that, what follows is bound to be annoying. “Chanhee wasn’t gonna come tonight.”

“Why?” Sunwoo asks. Chanhee can’t tell who exactly he’s asking, but Eric answers anyway.

“Cause he’s the ice queen, of course. Same ridiculous thing as always. Can’t seem to get along with-”

“I’m not a bitch.”

Eric smiles, mostly warm but not devoid of mocking, and says, “I don’t think you’re a bitch. It’s just funny.”

“It’s not even a thing. Like, a real thing. I’m an introvert, what do you expect?”

The atmosphere seems easy enough for everyone else, probably because their relationships with their section members aren’t constantly under speculation. Sunwoo cocks his head to the side and says, “But… you weren’t gonna come if there were any other violins?”

“I never said that,” he huffs. “I like the violins. I hang out with Namjoo all the time. There are just a few I don’t like.”

“Like?”

He tries not to look at Kevin when he says, “Obviously Beomseok is an asshole.”

Eric nods and says, “Well, yeah, but we would never invite him out. So you must have wanted to know about Jaehyun.”

An exhausting name. One he hears far too often for how little time they spend together. “I don’t care about Jaehyun.”

“Cared enough to ditch us, though?”

He takes another sip, wonders how difficult it would make his commute home if he got himself another drink. “No, I’m here, aren’t I?”

“I just don’t get why you’re always avoiding him. I love my cellos. Juyeon and I are getting dinner tomorrow.”

“Good for you, but that literally doesn’t count. Juyeon would eat dinner with a rat off the street if it asked nicely, and you’re already his rescue dog,” he snarks. Sangyeon and Jacob must think he’s pretty funny tonight. Jacob leans into Sunwoo’s side to laugh and nearly knocks his glass over.

“He’s a good guy, that’s all I’m saying,” Eric finishes, hands up. “And you guys have the  _ weirdest _ vibe, like, tension. I  _ know _ I’m not just making that up.” He looks around for nods of support, and Kevin, the betrayer, shrugs and indulges him.

“We don’t even really talk. There’s nothing to say about Jaehyun and I, or  _ any _ of the violins, really. We get along well enough. I keep to myself, and he pretends we know each other. End of story.”

Eric smirks, dissolves into a giggle, though that really isn’t the alcohol. Sometimes Chanhee glances at him across the stage during off moments at rehearsals and it looks like he’s barely holding back. “Okay, okay. Just want you to make friends.”

“You’re one to talk,” he volleys back, glad to shift the focus. “You’re our new baby. Can barely walk on your own.”

“I’m not a baby!” he whines. The irony is completely lost on him, but it gets everyone else. If Chanhee has to watch Jacob double over and grab at Sunwoo’s shoulder one more time, he might get impatient enough to ask him what he thinks he’s doing, if he thinks Sunwoo’s face is always that shade of red or if it might have something to do with Jacob’s hands on his arms.

“I’m just glad you have us,” he continues. “New kid on the block, and you somehow got in with the sexiest group in the orchestra. Lucky duck.”

“Oh, the ‘sexiest group in the orchestra’. That’s literally like the tallest group of gnomes, but whatever.”

“Can’t believe you’re the type to try and knock us nerds for brownie points. You  _ are _ us. Tragic,” he teases.

Eric, as annoying as he can be, has one of the best smiles Chanhee’s ever seen. Like a little brother, like a sunbeam cutting through a cloudy sky. He pushes Chanhee’s buttons, but the smile almost makes up for it. And the tiny deficit left after that is easily forgotten the second he starts to play.

Chanhee remembers the first day Eric showed up at rehearsal. Their group is young, sure, but it had been a total shock to see him there, looking for all the world like he had just come from a freshman performance class. Younghoon had found Chanhee before rehearsal began to gossip about how he had seen Eric stash a skateboard with his coat. That  _ still _ doesn’t make sense to Chanhee. But for every part of Eric that makes him stick out like a sore thumb, there’s a member of the orchestra twice his age who he could outplay.

Juyeon was the first to fold him in, and it didn’t take the rest of them long. He plays like water, languid and elegant, entirely opposite every other presentation of himself. He was new, they were impressed, and now he’s able to convince Chanhee to come out for drinks on a night he had been planning to spend in fuzzy pajama pants, instrument in hand.

“I love you,” he trills, grabbing for Chanhee’s hands on the table.

He rolls his eyes but lets Eric grab one, yanks it away in overacted disgust when he presses a kiss to the back. “You can love me less, though, it’s no problem.”

Jacob laughs but says, “Hey, not very nice.”

“Aren’t I the ‘ice queen’? Was that it?” he asks, cocking his brow.

“I’m not Jaehyun, though,” Eric whines.

“Annoying enough to deserve it.”

Eric pouts, but it’s an act. Chanhee makes sure to smile sweetly at him later, even pays for one of his drinks before he leaves.

But, exactly as he predicted, he is the first. He spends hours with them talking about mostly nothing peppered with occasional topics that make him anywhere from irritable to homicidal, and then he leaves.

And it was a good night.

He makes sure to let them know that it was a good night.

~

He fumbles with his keys, tired and a little buzzed. The catnap he took on the train back wasn’t nearly enough to make up for the energy he gave away at the bar, and it takes him an extra try to get his leg through the hole in his pajama pants. He’s speeding toward exhaustion, a true twenty-something grandfather.

Still, like every other night, with hands cold to the point of aching and eyes too dry to keep open, he plays.

He plays the same movement over and over again, then plays the same  _ measure _ over and over again. He stands in his living room in a giant old tee shirt and house slippers and gives himself away to his violin until he can’t bear to stand any longer.

It’s late. His shoulders ache sweetly, full of sugar, and he can’t sleep.

Tomorrow, he won’t go out for drinks. Tomorrow, he’ll come straight home, and even though today was good, that will be better.

~

A groggy morning, too much coffee, and some less intense practice wake him up, carry him through to the afternoon. He decides today is as good a day as any for his softest sweater and the earrings Changmin got him for his birthday last year, infused with comfort.

He takes the train. He thinks about a new case.

He sees the concert hall, the same one he used to pass on the way to school every day, the object of his dreams. Now, it’s his routine.

Still gilded.

He manages to shed his coat and rosin his bow without having to make small talk, and he  _ almost _ considers it a good sign. A slower day, maybe one full of practice and just on the wrong side of lonely, but easier than the rest.

Maybe he could have maintained that quiet illusion had Jaehyun not sat down across from him.

“Afternoon,” he greets, lifting the lid of his case. His voice is warm, warmer than it was yesterday. He smiles, and Chanhee’s almost convinced it’s meant for him.

“Hi.” An acknowledgment. It’s all he can give right now.

“How was your thing last night?”

It takes him a moment to remember he told Jaehyun about going out. “Oh, it was fine.”

“Get home early like you wanted?” He says it like there’s supposed to be a joke hidden somewhere. Chanhee can’t tell whether it’s aimed at him or not.

“Actually, no. I stayed a bit longer.”

He nods, absentmindedly drawing his bow across his brick of rosin. Looks new. “Feeling okay today?”

“Is this not how I usually am?”

He smiles again, but it doesn’t reach his eyes. This is the worse of his two smiles. Eric would be glad to hear that Chanhee genuinely likes Jaehyun’s eye smile, thinks it makes him look approachable. “Sorry. You just seem tired.”

He knows that’s the sort of thing that should offend him, but he’s right. “I am. And I think I slept weird on my shoulder.”

“Ooh, yikes. The shoulder-” he starts, tapping his own, “- is kind of important in this line of work.”

“At least I’m not a warehouse worker.”

Jaehyun laughs, and it hurts Chanhee’s ears, but it isn’t any worse than Eric’s default speaking volume. “Yeah, I guess. They probably don’t get to wear jewelry like that in warehouses, either.”

Instinctively reaching for his earlobe, he says, “I don’t know. I actually don’t know anything about warehouses.”

“Well I’m glad you work here. I like seeing you around.” Before Chanhee can catch up, Jaehyun stands with his violin in hand and heads toward the stage. “Let’s have a good rehearsal,” he calls over his shoulder, leaving Chanhee alone.

Usually he’s relieved when Jaehyun leaves (though he’s quick to argue that that doesn’t mean he’s cold). Now, though, the back room feels distinctly empty. Not the sort of place he wants to spend too much time. He finishes getting his things situated and heads out to the stage in record time, hoping the lights can kill the chill creeping in through the holes in the knit of his sweater.

He makes his way to today’s seat, seventh from the apron of the stage. Not a bad spot for someone his age, something his parents remind him every time he calls them in one of his insecure episodes ( _ “Can always do better, but this is something to be proud of.” _ ). He knows it’s better than he should expect.

Still, every time he has to shuffle through the row, he feels the pull of that first chair.

The chance to sit at Taeyeon’s left, to organize and delegate and know that the only obstacle to his improvement is his own motivation. It’s all in sharp contrast to his place now; good, but just cruel enough to show him the stone’s throw he’s missed by.

He hasn’t been in his seat long before Beomseok starts the tuning. It’s the same as always, a disjointed jumble of sound at the beginning, a riot of buzzing that slowly melts together into something they can mold however they want. His brother never understood when he tried to explain, but this is one of Chanhee’s favorite parts.

A part he can’t necessarily do by himself in his apartment. A part that reminds him he belongs to something else. A part that drags him away from the itch of the ladder, the need to pull himself up by his own thinning thread of patience.

He tunes, and he feels himself fall in line with the rest.

Mostly, rehearsal runs exactly as it always does.

More mistakes today. Not more notes, just more mistakes. If Taeyeon had heard him on his own, she could fill an entire notebook with critiques. Luckily, he was sucked into the sea, his mistakes blending with the rest, standing out only when everyone else misstepped too. They stop and start constantly, nothing out of the ordinary on the whole.

But once he starts tripping up, it becomes the sole occupation of his mind.

One mistake snowballs to three. He stops counting but never stops wincing when he hears. The instrument so familiar is harder to hold today, doesn’t listen to him the way it normally does.

Shouldn’t have gone out last night.

_ ‘Well I’m glad you work here. I like seeing you around.’ _

“Stop, back two measures!” Taeyeon calls. “Music says allegro, let’s pick up the pace. I’m falling asleep.”

Jaehyun had smiled at him. Not the good one, but still warm. The way Juyeon smiles at him sometimes. Nothing out of the ordinary, really a daily occurrence, and yet-

“Allegro!” she presses. Doesn’t stop them, but Chanhee swears she looks at him in the crowd.

All the times he shrugged Jaehyun off.  _ Was _ he being cold? Jaehyun’s never had much to say to him. Except ‘ _ well I’m glad you work here _ ’.

“Stop!”

Tonight, he’ll make up for his mistakes. He’ll play these few measures a hundred times each or until he can play them better in his sleep than Beomseok can in performance. Tonight will be productive.

It’ll have to be; he can’t reel his mind back in now that it’s gone.

Rehearsal creeps by in its usual stilted, red-light-green-light way. He plays when he’s supposed to, tries his best to stay present (though it’s mostly a lost cause), and tries harder still to forget everything from earlier. If he has to be so sloppy today, it should at least be over something more significant than his treatment of a distant coworker.

Distantly kind.

A constant face in his section, three seats down today, separated by a partition of older women whose perfumes are too strong.

He can feel himself falling behind on the pace of the piece, and Taeyeon calls rehearsal. Hours whiled away in his own head while his fingers tripped over themselves on the neck of his 909. Not meditative because the piece isn’t slow; not religious because he’s somewhere else.

They all break from one orchestra into many pieces, making their ways to the back like always. Chanhee catches Haknyeon draping himself over Jacob’s shoulders looking soft and ready for a nap, Sunwoo and Changmin hovering around their chairs talking too animatedly for the amount of time they had to kindle a conversation. He catches Kevin speeding over to Sangyeon, cutting through the row of chairs so he can avoid walking past first violin.

Sometimes he stays out here to socialize too.

Maybe he should.

“Jaehyun,” he starts.

He doesn’t look up at first, focused on something on his phone. Then, “Huh?”

“Brave to have the phone out here while Taeyeon’s on the pre-concert warpath,” he jokes.

“Oh, Chanhee,” he says, eyes wide. Another beat and he adds, “Yeah, can’t imagine what she’d do to me if it somehow went off. Probably something illegal.” He laughs, just as loud as last time. Doesn’t hurt quite as much now.

Sometimes he has to riffle through his brain for something to talk about with people he doesn’t know. Nothing to say, most times. But here, “So what’s so important?”

He smiles conspiratorially like they’re both in on a joke, a look Chanhee can’t remember ever seeing on him before. “Date tonight. Wanted to make sure I would at least know if any updates came in.”

He swallows, a bit short of breath. He’s always wondered how Sangyeon could survive an entire concert; he can barely breathe well enough to keep himself alive during a normal conversation, let alone perform on a woodwind for hours without passing out. “Mhmm, updates?”

“Like if they cancel. They’re an EMT so… something could always come up,” he shrugs.

Chanhee nods, laughs shallowly and says, “The two jobs with the weirdest schedules. Sounds like a match made in heaven.”

“We’ll see,” he laughs. “Haven’t met in person yet.”

“Oh! Uh, good luck then.”

“Thanks,” he nods. Starts chewing on the corner of his lip, asks, “Feeling better now? You seem… I don’t know, in a better mood.”

_ I just fumbled over two hours of rehearsal and made more mistakes on a familiar piece than I can remember making in one sitting in months. _

“I have a bit more energy, I think. A little better.”

“Good.” There’s more to say, Chanhee can see it. “Well, I should probably go. No messages, so the date’s still on. See you tomorrow.” He ducks his head, tucks his instrument under his arm. Waves at Chanhee and heads to the back.

He could follow. Everything he brought is back there.

But Jaehyun already said goodbye and Kevin’s doubled over in laughter less than fifteen feet away. His friends are out here, the ones he already has, the ones he hasn’t been keeping at an arm’s length.

So he stays and talks to them.

By the time he goes to grab his things, Jaehyun is long gone.

~

It’s rough work making up for rehearsal.

The second he got home, he pulled his sheet music out, littered with fresh notes. Set it up and prepared his instrument, stretched his back (which has been hurting even worse lately), and got to work.

Hasn’t stopped since.

Afternoon rehearsals are harder than morning, he thinks, because the stretch from the moment he opens his apartment door to sunset is so much shorter than it is on morning days. Less work, less time to forget himself and play until he can’t use his arms for anything else.

But, throughout his time as a musician, he’s become truly exceptional at making time.

When he finally sets his 909 down, he’s hungry and tired. He has a missed call from Changmin and a crick in his neck that won’t roll away.

He has a perfect run under his belt, and another after that one. And another, and another.

No more mistakes.


	2. Rhapsody

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Rhapsody - an instrumental composition irregular in form and suggestive of improvisation

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hope you're having a good day! I've been really, _really_ busy lately, but I'm still gonna try to upload pretty regularly, and I already have the whole thing written sooooooo I imagine it won't take too long to get the whole piece up!
> 
> Anyways, this chapter is more dynamic than the first, so I hope you enjoy where it takes the story!

It’s easier to wake up after having stayed in the previous night, easier to pull himself out of bed and go through his routine. He tries something new with his outfit, something a bit more put together than he usually does for rehearsals.

Eric notices.

“What, are you trying to impress someone?” He smirks and jokes, “Sorry Chanhee, but I’m working on cuffing someone right now. Not available. Don’t be too sad, though, I’ll put you on the waitlist.”

“I’m not trying to impress anyone,  _ especially _ you.”

“You look nice today, Chanhee,” Younghoon compliments in passing. It only fuels Eric’s complex.

“Can’t I just look good for myself?”

“Yeah, but wouldn’t you be doing that every day?”

“I  _ do _ look good every day, brat.”

“Okay, believe whatever you wanna believe,” he pesters. “I’m gonna go flirt with Changmin.”

“I literally don’t care.”

“Love you,” he calls and disappears around the corner, probably headed to the hidden nook of practice rooms Changmin likes to hang around while he listens to serial killer podcasts to kill time when he arrives too early.

And then Chanhee is alone. Alone in the sense that there are a few other early arrivals going about their mornings, people he doesn’t need or want to talk to, but no friends. No reason for him to hang back in this room, by far the most cavelike of any in the concert hall. Cold and dark, meant only as a checkpoint and not a stop.

But where else could he go, really?

He finds a stray folding chair and sits, pulls out his phone and turns the brightness down by half. His eyesight is already deteriorating; no need to help Mother Nature along, she’s perfectly capable of ruining him herself.

Scrolling mindlessly through instagram isn’t normally something he can do once he’s arrived at the hall, so he almost feels like he should try to be more present and appreciate the nothingness of it. There’s something a bit  _ too _ nothing about it, though. It lets his mind wander.

Eric’s comments at the bar come back to him. ‘ _ You weren’t gonna come if there were any other violins? _ ’ crawls under his skin. ‘ _ He’s a good guy _ ’ rests in the shell of his ear, whispers, “ _ Are you? _ ”

Is he?

The tap of wood against the floor, something with weight. Another chair being dragged, and Jaehyun pulling it up a safe distance from where Chanhee sits. He puts his phone away.

“Morning, Chanhee. Long day ahead of us.” A softly sloping smile reminiscent of the pictures of cats Kevin and Juyeon are always sending him.

“Uh, yeah. Morning, Jaehyun.” He knows the next line, knows it’s his. “How did your date go?”

Jaehyun doesn’t even look up from the bow in his hands as he answers, “Eh, it was okay. Not bad or anything, but I don't think we ‘clicked’. Probably won’t be seeing them again.”

Chanhee’s found Jaehyun’s confidence in sharing things surprising. He doesn’t hesitate to say the truest version of what he knows, doesn’t let a lack of relationship with someone stop him from telling them what’s happening in his head. The more Chanhee speaks with him, the more he thinks their small talk had been the only sort of empty nicety Jaehyun can handle.

It’s disconcerting, not navigable in the same way conversations with other people are. The typical script doesn’t fit quite right. “Ah, I’m sorry.”

“Don’t be sorry. I didn’t think it was gonna work anyway. Just wanted to try.”

Chanhee crosses and uncrosses his legs, grapples for something to busy himself with. “Well, maybe if you keep looking, you’ll find something that does.”

He doesn’t know what he’s saying, and Jaehyun must be able to tell. He looks up and fixes Chanhee with an appraising look, says, “Yeah, I guess. Got anyone in mind?”

“If I did, they wouldn’t be available.”

“That’s fair,” he laughs. Runs his hand over the bow stick and his tongue over his lip, thinking. Chanhee pulls his blazer tighter around his waist. Jaehyun looks up at him and says, “Who knows? Might not have to look very far.”

Just like that, he leans back in his plastic chair and remembers himself. Chanhee may be distant, deliberately unfamiliar with the way Jaehyun operates, but he isn’t stupid. “Hmm, maybe,” he agrees, grabbing his instrument and brushing himself off. “I might head out to the stage. See you later?”

Jaehyun’s eyebrows knit down the way Jacob’s do when Changmin talks about his ‘children’ (the various horror villains he’s so sweet on) and he presses his lips together in a tight line, but he lets Chanhee go. No questions, just, “Okay, see you later.”

It’s still early, but here, he can be by himself. Even as musicians begin to press in and surround him from all sides, he gets to be Chanhee, just Chanhee. And then rehearsal starts, and he isn’t even that; he gets to melt into the orchestra, the collective bound in sheet music and Taeyeon’s arms like bird wings.

While he’s still Chanhee, it’s better to be presumptuous than to fall behind. Better to nip things in the bud.

Better to assume that when Jaehyun was talking proximity, he meant the distance between their chairs in the dark.

~

“You can’t say no.”

It’s an interesting way to start a conversation.

“Yes I can. I don’t know what you’re talking about, but I definitely can.”

“We’re getting lunch together today,” Kevin explains, trying to keep up with Chanhee’s determined pace. “That little café a couple blocks over with the good crepes. Can’t remember what it’s called.”

“The Sunroom,” he supplies. “Kind of a weird pick considering I haven’t seen the sun in over a week-”

“What do you say?” he asks, rocking on his heels.

He can’t imagine he’ll be particularly good company, but Kevin’s put on his begging face and it has been just over too long since he’s had crepes, so, “Okay, sure.”

It’s near enough to walk, and despite the cold, it’s nice out. The sky is colored by the sort of thin light that comes in around winter and sets everything in shades of Tchaikovsky. It rained during rehearsal and the street shines with it, and Chanhee lets Kevin hold his hand. He breathes in the air and resets.

They order and find a little table in the smallest room where one chair is against a window and the other is situated squarely in the corner. Kevin leans against the glass with his coat still on.

“Tired today.”

“Lucky for you, we only have another two hours of rehearsal.”

Kevin groans and hides his face in his hands.

“Eat,” Chanhee nags. “No way you’ll make it through the day if you don’t have enough lunch.”

He nods and cuts off a chunk of his crepe (one of the best on the menu, second only to Chanhee’s usual order), thinks for a moment and then asks, “So you’re talking with Jaehyun now?”

He rolls his eyes and fixes Kevin with a glare, never pausing his own eating. “I don’t even know what that means. We talked before.”

“I mean, not really, though.”

“We did, but that doesn’t even matter. Just small talk. I don’t know why you’re all so fixated on this.”

Always so considerate, he asks, “Do you want me to stop asking you about it?”

“You don’t have to do anything. I just don’t get it.”

Kevin shrugs and looks out the window. Chanhee grabs his fork and cuts a bit off his own crepe, holds it out for Kevin to try. They eat in silence, sharing every few bites, before Kevin says, “I just want you to have fun, you know? Like, I want you to enjoy your life. Do things outside of music.”

“I do things outside of music,” he defends.

“You do,” Kevin nods. “But those are like, errands. One-off things everyone does to stay alive.”

“So you think I need a hobby?”

“Not necessarily a hobby. Just something to spend time on that you don’t feel life-or-death level intense about. Like, even just hanging out with someone else.”

“We’re having lunch together right now.”

“This is rare, though,” he says, reaching to take another bite of Chanhee’s food. “You spend most of your social time with Changmin and I, and you still don’t see us very often.” Chanhee shrugs it off, so Kevin continues, “You haven’t dated anyone since I met you.”

“Yes I have.”

“I mean, you’ve been on dates. But you haven’t had a person, you know?”

Chanhee scowls and argues, “What if I’m aromantic? Huh?”

“Then that’s fine,” Kevin answers softly. “Are you?”

He takes another bite to avoid answering and Kevin smiles.

“You obviously don’t have to or anything. You could just spend more time with us, or you  _ could _ get a hobby if you want. Just… something. You’re so intense, which is perfectly fine, but I feel like…”

“Like it’s too much.”

“Like it’s hurting you,” he amends.

He wishes for just a second that he was on the side with the window. He could brave the cold to have an excuse to look somewhere other than Kevin. Luckily, Kevin is accommodating, more so than some of their other friends, and he lets him duck out even without the window.

“So, I’m doing lessons Saturday morning. After that, I think I’m gonna file a complaint.”

“Oh.” It catches him off guard. He tries to quickly match Kevin’s nonchalance instead of celebrating the way he’d like to. “That’s good. I’m glad. Do you need help, or...?”

“No, I just wanted you to know.”

“Well I’m really glad.”

Kevin squints at him across the table and laughs.

“What?”

“I just… kinda figured you’d be trashing him.”

“God, do you want me to?” he asks, dropping his fork in the little plastic cup of feta cheese he asked for on the side. “Cause I wouldn’t use that man as a  _ doormat _ , let alone a concertmaster. He’s an ugly bitch who’s going to hell and who probably won’t live much longer here anyway if he keeps showing his face around the hall when I’m in a bad mood.” He bats his eyes and smiles, ties it off with a pretty ribbon. It makes Kevin laugh.

“Yeah, that’s more what I was expecting.”

They finish their lunch with time to spare and take their time walking back to the concert hall. Chanhee fishes his earbuds out of his bag and sequesters himself just past the bend in one of the ornate hall staircases to listen to the first few tracks on a new album Changmin’s been pestering him about. Kills a few minutes there and stretches his shoulders, eventually heads back to the stage.

Jaehyun is already there, and none of the women sitting between them have arrived yet. It isn’t an issue for Chanhee; he takes his seat and starts getting his sheet music ready.

For a moment, he gets the feeling Jaehyun is going to talk to him. Fortunately, he doesn’t.

Fortunately.

~

The afternoon stint is exhausting, so when Younghoon invites him over for a group dinner, he doesn’t protest. His visceral need to avoid making his own food by himself wins out over his apprehension about a dinner the night before a concert. All he can muster is a “Not too late.” Younghoon nods and grabs Chanhee’s bag, knowing he prefers to carry his own case. Instead of getting off at his own stop on the train, he rides until they reach the part of town Younghoon and Changmin are set up in.

“Here, I’ll help you until everyone else gets here.”

“Okay,” Younghoon agrees and hands him a lemon. “Here, I need zest.”

“Where’s your zester?”

He laughs and answers, “I don’t know what genre of rich person you think I am, but I use a grater for about a million different things,  _ especially _ this. It’s in that drawer over there.”

“Where’s Changmin?”

“He and Hak are going to get a few more ingredients. They’ll be here soon probably.”

Chanhee nods and starts grating. Younghoon bustles around the kitchen, grabbing the things he already has on hand, until they hear the door open around the corner.

“Did you get everything?” Younghoon calls, bringing a pot of water to a boil.

“Yeah,” Changmin answers before nodding at Chanhee and greeting, “Hey, wasn’t sure whether you’d come.”

“Yeah, well,” he shrugs. “I didn’t wanna have to cook by myself.” Changmin laughs and it puts him at ease. “Hey, I listened to a little bit of that album. Good so far.”

“Ah, isn’t it? I know it’s not your taste, but-”

“Hey, Haknyeon? Do you have the bags?” Younghoon calls.

Hak carries their haul into the kitchen and the two of them continue to catch up. They manage to go unnoticed by the kitchen crew until Sangyeon arrives and greets them. Then, Younghoon starts whining about them shirking responsibility.

It’s a light meal, a light evening. The five of them sit in a circle on the sofa and floor of the living room since the dining table only has three chairs (Chanhee asked, but neither one can remember where the fourth went), and they say grace at Sangyeon’s request. Make conversation and eat good food made better by the knowledge they all worked on it (though Younghoon is quick to point out that some contributed more than others).

Chanhee has a good time. He thinks of Kevin’s plea earlier today that he try to spend more of his time on things other than crowding himself out of his own head, and he thinks this is exactly what he meant.

~

He doesn’t practice when he gets home.

In the morning, he pulls on his softest pair of sweatpants and a big sweatshirt Sangyeon gave him because he mentioned liking the color when he borrowed it once. He gets on the train and admires the houndstooth on his case, remembers picking it because it reminded him of a pencil skirt his mom used to wear to work when he was little.

He changes into his suit in record time and applies a little makeup in the mirror (a little more than normal, he’s feeling good today). Someday he’ll go to Taeyeon and ask for more creative liberty with his concert attire; he  _ knows _ he could come up with something better. Still classy and non-distracting, but something that would make him feel the way he does when he gets dressed up to go out with Kevin or Juyeon. Pretty. Confident.

For today, the same suit as everyone else and extra delicate eye makeup is enough.

He sits tall in his seat, plays with pride all through dress rehearsal. Follows Taeyeon’s lead, follows the uncharacteristically light way his arms feel with the violin today. Not like they’re trapped, not like they’re someone else’s. Just like they’re playing, and playing well.

Like he’s Chanhee playing the violin.

It’s okay to feel that way now; it’s only dress rehearsal.

It’s okay to be relaxed, content for once. He doesn’t stumble, doesn’t make petty mistakes, and he feels  _ good _ . Now, he can risk feeling good.

Still feels good as he’s leaving the stage after bows to an empty audience. Still feels good when he’s gingerly tucking his instrument into its case and itching to change back into his sweats, when Jaehyun sidles up to him and says, “Hey, Chanhee.”

He hasn’t forgotten the last time they spoke, but he  _ has _ prayed since then. Second chances. “Hi. How are you?”

If Jaehyun is surprised, he doesn’t show it. “I’m okay. You seem to be having a good day.”

“Can you tell?” he asks, smiling.

Jaehyun laughs and says, “I don’t think I’ve ever seen you in such a good mood.”

“I had a good night, and I guess it just bled over.”

His eyes widen in a way Chanhee can’t quite read. Mild interest, maybe. Something under the surface. “Good night. That’s good.”

Chanhee bites his lip and rocks back on his heels. If this conversation died here, it would be okay. He used to go days only ever sending curt nods Jaehyun’s way, only ever receiving second thought waves on the way out. It would be okay, but he’s still relieved when Jaehyun continues, “A few hours to kill before the concert tonight. What’s your game plan?”

“Usually, locking myself in one of the practice rooms. Sometimes a nap.”

“Today?”

He thinks. What today? “I don’t really know.” He slings his bag over his shoulder and asks, “You?”

“A nap sounds good,” he admits, one hand rubbing the back of his neck harshly. “I think you and I have balanced each other out today.”

“Oh,” he frowns. “So you’re not doing so hot.”

“Nothing a bit of rest can’t fix.”

Chanhee nods, watches him grab his things. “Yeah.” Ignores the sinking feeling in his chest. “Well, rest up. I’ll see you later.” He pulls his phone from his pocket, figures he can at least listen to the rest of that album.

“Hey, Chanhee.”

“Hmm?”

He brings his hand to his neck again, furrows his brows. “I’ll be back way before the concert starts. Just, I’ll be free for a while.”

“Mmm, okay,” he nods. It’s uncharted territory, different from even the ground he walked on waking up yesterday morning. Feels a little less sure. But the view is nice. “Cool. I’ll be free too.”

He nods and leaves without further preamble. That seems to be a common thing when they talk, an abrupt end.

He hadn’t thought much about Jaehyun until the bar. Sure, sometimes he would complain to his friends about Jaehyun breaking his concentration during practice or humming too loudly on his walks around the hall or wearing enough cologne for Chanhee to smell it a few seats over. But beyond petty criticism, there was almost nothing to think  _ about _ .

But watching him go and knowing he won’t be back for hours, Chanhee is thinking.

Thinking about how just the day before, Kevin transitioned seamlessly from asking about Jaehyun to asking about dating, and Chanhee hadn’t even jumped on him for it. Thinking about how now every time Jaehyun strikes up a conversation in the back room, good or bad, Chanhee remembers it.

He slinks off to pull on his sweats and cue up the album, hopes to find some secluded corner of the hall where he can be alone. He never planned to go home today, but he still doesn’t want anyone stumbling upon him in the middle of any of his rituals.

Once he’s in place (on the same staircase from the day before, his favorite with sloping gold railings), time slows down. He runs out of Changmin’s music and starts listening to his own, killing time until six.

Jaehyun isn’t back by then, so he goes ahead and prays. Clears his mind, centers himself, and when he’s done, it’s only 6:12.

Concert days are always this odd sort of empty. Full of anticipation and time to be nervous, constructed around nearly six hours of playing and nothing else except restless hands and the train back to his apartment in the dark.

He has hours still to go. Maybe he should have gone home. Maybe he should have found Kevin an hour ago to join him for whichever movie he’s watching this time or followed Haknyeon to wherever he always disappears to. Crashed whatever weird, oblivious flirting Sunwoo and Jacob are undoubtedly doing.

But he didn’t do those things, and now he’s run out of things to do on his own.

Sometimes he sees Jaehyun during his rounds. He isn’t sure whether he does them before every concert or just some, but it isn’t hard to find him when he’s out. Chanhee comes down from his perch. Maybe he’ll try that.

He doesn’t usually take the time to truly admire the hall anymore. Back when he was first offered a place in the orchestra, he would spend hours wandering the building, taking pictures and making note of hidden gems. He didn’t ever want the magic to wear off.

One of his favorite places at the beginning had been the lobby where the concert-goers come in. He had spent every second he could looking up at the ornately curving ceiling and the gold accents, all the things he used to imagine would decorate his future. And they do. He goes there first, navigates the labyrinthine corridors until he sees the familiar glint of the front doors and the deep, coffee-colored trim around the edge of the room. Gets ready to plunge himself into nostalgia while he looks.

“Oh, Chanhee,” Jaehyun laughs.

And something happens in his chest, runs down to the tips of his fingers. A tiny thrill, smaller than the one he gets on stage. A hummingbird to the eagle.

“Hey. Back so soon?”

“What’d I tell you? Power nap. Good as new.”

Chanhee surveys the wrinkles in his jacket and the way his hair is tousled less like a model’s and more a student’s fresh off the plane home for the holidays and nods, lets a little sarcasm into his voice and says, “Yeah, good as new.”

“Wow, was that joke?” he asks, smiling in the unguarded way he does whenever Chanhee catches him by surprise (happens more and more).

“Maybe,” he shrugs. Ignores the honey in his own voice; as long as none of his friends are here, he should take advantage of the fact that no one can pester him about it. “Are you walking?”

“Uh, yeah, actually,” he answers, head cocked to the side. He looks like a confused dog. “How do you…?”

“I see you around sometimes. I sit on the stairs to the balcony entrance to pray.”

“Ah.”

He never would have done this a week ago. Two days ago, even. But, “Could I walk with you?”

He can’t remember ever seeing Jaehyun so… pleasantly surprised? Though he could never be persuaded to admit it out loud, he’s always seen Jaehyun as the nonchalant, ‘cool’ type Eric aspires to be. Always laughing about something (annoying), always feeling okay. Maybe not knowing exactly what’s happening around him, but always working with it.

Now, his jaw hangs open slightly. His eyes are round and his lips are parted, dahlia petals waiting. “Uh, sure. Yeah, you can come.” He tugs at the end of his jacket and adds, “You know I just kind of walk around aimlessly. There isn’t, like, a goal.”

“I know,” he shrugs. “Don’t have anything better to do.”

He laughs at that, says, “Wow, I feel so special.”

“Oh, then I take it back. That was never my intention.”

“I always figured you were funny,” he says, shaking his head. “Kinda dry and mean, but funny.”

He’s already started walking, so Chanhee has to catch up to match his steps. He does in no time, though, and protests, “I’m not mean.”

“Mean in a nice way,” Jaehyun amends. “Just… smart. But you use it for evil.” Chanhee feels his eyes roll before he can stop them and Jaehyun laughs, “See! You’re fun mean.”

He won’t lie; it’s nice having someone around who thinks of him as ‘fun’, even if it’s qualified immediately by ‘like a bitchy high school girl’. “Fine, whatever.” That only makes Jaehyun laugh again. Gun to his head, Chanhee  _ might  _ admit that that had been the goal.

They make their way through the main hallways the visitors walk on their way to the performance hall, working through getting to know each other backwards.

“-so I kind of got into classical music because of my family, though none of them are violinists-”

“Your family?”

Normally, by the time he’s divulging his personal history with classical, his audience has at least a basic grasp on his general life. But he and Jaehyun have done things differently. “Oh, yeah, duh. My brother actually played here for two years about a decade ago. I forgot you don’t, you know, know anything about me.”

“I know a little bit,” Jaehyun defends absently, mostly focused on crafting their route so they run into as few dead ends as possible.

“You really don’t.” He doesn’t even wait for Jaehyun’s reaction before adding, “Not your fault, obviously. I don’t know anything about you either.”

“I’m sure you do.”

And Chanhee can  _ feel _ it, the shift towards the sort of conversation he never planned on having. “Jaehyun… I know you’re a violinist who usually sits a few seats down from me on stage. You seem nice and talkative… that’s it,” he finishes. “I think you’ll find I’m not very observant.”

“I’m gonna be honest,” he warns, eyes still ahead, voice low. Chanhee straightens up and flexes his fingers, listens. “I think you  _ are _ observant, you just haven’t been observing  _ me _ . Which is fine.”

Chanhee swallows thickly, throat dry. He left his water bottle with his bag in the cave.

“But I’ve always thought you were interesting,” he continues. “God, I hope that isn’t actually as creepy as I think it sounds,” he laughs, but it doesn’t sound like his other laughs. This one has an edge, feels more fragile and less free.

Truth is, it should be. Chanhee imagines someone like Beomseok saying something like that, and it turns his stomach. He imagines anyone but his friends saying it, and he  _ knows _ his defenses would be up in the blink of an eye. But Jaehyun’s voice is nice. He makes mild small talk when he can, even though Chanhee doesn’t think it’s the sort of thing that comes naturally to him. He plays an old Wyss of gorgeous reddish wood that Chanhee pretends he isn’t jealous of and handles it with a gentleness that seems so fitting and so out of character all at once. He makes Chanhee think that he really doesn’t know enough  _ about _ that character, but he’d like to. So, “It isn’t.”

“Good.”

Chanhee follows him through the hall, splitting his attention between the architecture he used to give everything to and the colleague he’s done what he can to keep at a distance. Something’s happened to change that, though, and Chanhee can’t quite pinpoint the moment it turned. All he knows is that ‘colleague’ feels a little worn out, old clothing he still wears because he hasn’t quite found a replacement yet.

All his friends think they know the replacement.

Chanhee doesn’t know anything about Jaehyun, but he wants to.

“Can I ask you something that might sound mean at first?”

“Fun mean?” he asks, playful.

“Mmm, no, I think just mean.”

He shrugs and says, “I won’t stop you.”

That’s as strong a go-ahead as he can expect to stem from such an opener. “Do you, like, have friends here?”

Jaehyun furrows his brows and muffles a laugh. “Excuse me?”

“I just… I haven’t really been watching, but I don’t see you hanging out with people very often. And we don’t know each other, but we’re here now. Do you have people here you  _ do _ know?”

“Yeah, of course,” he answers. “I’m actually kind of close with Eric.”

“Huh?” He had never noticed. “Why weren’t you at the bar that night when he invited me? You know, recently? And why didn’t you tell me you knew what I was talking about when I told you?”

He shrugs and says, “Didn’t seem relevant. And my sister was hosting a dinner that night and wanted the whole family there.” He laughs and says, “As I hear it, you’re actually the one they usually have trouble getting to come out.”

“Yeah,” he confirms. “But I went that time.” And then, without waiting for permission from his brain, he adds, “Would’ve been nice to have you there.”

No, it wouldn’t have.

But he doesn’t take it back.

“Maybe sometime soon we can get some overlap.”

“Isn’t right now overlap?”

Jaehyun shrugs, doesn’t answer.

They keep walking. Chanhee checks his phone, and it’s been half an hour. Running out of the time he had declared dead on arrival. “Should we head back? Just over an hour.”

“Yeah, probably.”

He knows he can change quickly, he’s had it down to a science for years now. Jaehyun’s ready as he is, wandering around the hall looking like an heir playing dress up, mismatched against Chanhee’s sweats. If they weren’t professionals, or if they were friends, they could dare to stay longer.

They don’t.

Instead, Chanhee does something that makes his skin buzz like a risk, something that he can brush off and kill if anyone asks.

“Ah, wait,” he stops Jaehyun before he turns. “Sorry, your collar,” he explains, hesitantly reaching out to flatten the side of the starched white collar. Moves to adjust his tie and pulls down at the top of the shirt to smooth everything out. Jaehyun doesn’t say anything, just watches him.

He pulls back, forces his hands to stay still at his sides. “There you go.”

“Thanks.”

On the way back, they fall back to small talk (Chanhee’s growing to hate it). Jaehyun laughs at things that aren’t funny (Chanhee’s growing out of his hate of it) and they arrive back where Chanhee stashed his bag with time to spare.

They part ways and Chanhee gets ready. Touches up his makeup and tucks his clothes together, presses himself into the same mold every other musician on that stage fits in and gets ready to melt.

They don’t cross paths again until Chanhee’s shuffling to his seat. Jaehyun’s already there a few feet down, separated by that same wall of women, in his own world. Scanning his music one last time, it looks like. Chanhee wonders whether he does that before every concert, or if it’s just tonight. He busies himself with his own music and waits.

The audience is quiet. Beomseok starts to tune. Chanhee spends his last seconds thinking about the lightness he woke up with and the heat from Jaehyun’s neck under his hands. Hands made for playing but that wanted, just for a second, to hold.

Hands made for playing.

The second he raises his violin under the stage lights and the sweep of Taeyeon’s arm, everything falls away. No more trains or cafés or classic wood cases. No more concert hall corridors, no more Jaehyun. No more body. No more mind.

No more Chanhee.

Just like always.

~

He drifts away on Mozart.

Well, not  _ he _ . The energy he becomes with a body in his hands, a neck under his fingertips.

It’s prayer.

Well, not  _ prayer _ . Something more like penitence.

Chanhee thinks he’s close to being what he is in his dreams. Independent, flying higher than everyone else. Dependent, falling apart when the magic doesn’t erase him like he needs.

Chanhee thinks things are going to be okay, even if he doesn’t understand what that means right now.

~

He goes through the post-concert motions. Tonight is one of those where he smiles with endorphins, the way his dad used to when he went running. The corners of his lips pull up with fishing line and he finds his friends after.

“Hey, Chanhee!” Juyeon greets. “No rehearsal tomorrow morning-”

“No,” he tries his best to deadpan, but he can’t with his face split like this.

Juyeon grabs his wrist and swings their hands together, says, “You’ll be the only one missing. Come on, it’s a Friday night.”

“Where? I’m not going to that same bar again. No way am I gonna be part of the group that single-handedly financially supports such a gross hole in the wall.”

“You use public transportation every day.”

His jaw drops and he brings a hand up to smother his laugh. “Oh my God.” He’s about to pry Juyeon’s fingers from his wrist when he catches a glimpse of Eric over his shoulder. Eric in a similar position to Juyeon (if Chanhee focuses, he’s sure he could hear the begging), his hand on Jaehyun’s forearm.

It’s the purest irony.

He hears a tiny voice in his head mocking his messiness, the way he suddenly can’t seem to keep Jaehyun at the arbitrary arm’s length he’s idled at for so long. “Fine.”

“Really?”

“I guess.”

“Honestly, we probably won’t be there too long. Not as long as we were Tuesday, anyway.”

“God,” Chanhee whines, two fingers pressed to his temple in performative exhaustion. “Can’t believe I’ve gone out drinking twice this week. That’s so messy.”

“The glamorous life of a rockstar,” Juyeon jokes with a wink.

He leaves Chanhee to get his things ready, but not before making him promise he’ll call if he gets home and decides not to come after all. It’s a gentle out, nothing like how someone like Eric or Haknyeon might send him off.

How would Jaehyun? Chanhee can’t imagine it.

He tries, though. On the train home, in front of the mirror examining a new outfit, pushing open the grimy door of the bar, he tries to imagine Jaehyun beyond platitudes.

They’re at that same round booth, almost all of them. Sunwoo and Jacob are nowhere to be found, but that isn’t out of the ordinary. What  _ is _ out of the ordinary is Jaehyun leaning into the vinyl of the booth, listening intently to a story with wide eyes and parted lips.

And Eric, the little rat, noticing Chanhee’s arrival and immediately  _ pointing directly at him _ .

“Chanhee! My favorite-”

“I’ll kill you.”

He laughs and reaches for Chanhee’s hand, only allowed to hold it through the divine grace of Chanhee’s own heart. “Hey, I love you,” he slurs.

“Why is Eric already drunk?”

“What, did you want him to wait for you?” Haknyeon asks.

“Somebody better have volunteered already to take him home when-”

“Relax,” Sangyeon soothes. “I’ve got him.”

He bristles at the way Sangyeon tells him to relax so soon, as if this is what Chanhee acts like when he’s angry. He  _ isn’t _ angry, he just arrived.

Today was a good day, even.

“Whatever.”

He presses himself into the space on the end of the booth right next to Changmin, takes a sip of his drink and grimaces. “This is disgusting.”

“Thanks,” he laughs. “You can get your own if you’d prefer.”

Shakes his head, says, “No, not really planning on drinking tonight.”

Changmin shrugs and takes his glass back. Chanhee tries to get into whichever story they’re telling now, maybe the time Haknyeon accidentally misled a tinder date to believe he was a  _ punk  _ bassist ( _ “What? He asked if I was punk, I think I’m pretty punk!” _ ). As far as Chanhee knows, Jaehyun is the only one who’s never heard it before, but he laughs loudly enough that it would seem from the outside like they’re all in hysterics.

Slowly, Eric is joined by a few others in his drunken good mood. They poke fun when Jacob and Sunwoo arrive within minutes of each other and hang off their shoulders, asking what took them so long.

Sunwoo blushes down to the collar of his shirt and Jacob brushes them off, just like always.

It’s pitch night outside and Chanhee does his best to focus on his friends, not the ache in his arms and the way today has felt  _ so _ long, a year condensed into hours. He does well for a while.

Jaehyun excuses himself to the bar and asks the table for orders. Eric nods, but Juyeon leans back out of his line of sight and swipes his finger across his neck, the universal symbol for ‘nope, he’s cut off’. Jaehyun furrows his brows and gives a curt nod, lips pursed like a duck’s bill, and it’s funny enough to make Chanhee crack a smile.

He’s still smiling when Jaehyun turns to him and asks, “Chanhee? You want anything?”

Something warm in his eyes. “No, I’m fine. Thanks.”

“Just checking,” he nods and disappears.

As soon as he leaves, Kevin leans across the table, brows raised, and says, “Didn’t check on me, though.”

He rolls his eyes (makes no attempt to mask it this time) and groans. “Do you guys not have anything better to think about?”

“No, absolutely not,” he deadpans. “I saw you around the hall today.”

A few of them bristle at that, leaning just an inch or so forward. Kevin’s got them captivated with smoke and mirrors.

“I mean, yeah, we went on a walk. I thought you wanted me to make friends?”

His eyes glint in the low light of the bar, smiling the way he does when he means mischief. “I do. Is that what you’re doing?”

“I’m not doing anything.”

“Things really have changed since Tuesday,” Sunwoo joins in.

“You don’t wanna play that game with me, Sunwoo.” He must see it in Chanhee’s eyes because he balks, leans back and pouts.

“Look, he’s hot. He’s nice. I don’t see why-”

“And you wouldn’t,” he interrupts, saccharine. “Kevin, my dear, sweet friend, there’s nothing to see.”

Usually when he gets like this, it’s with Sunwoo or Eric. Kevin’s normally too congenial, only pushing so far before he rolls over like a puppy and lets Chanhee have his stubbornness. But something about tonight (or something about  _ this _ argument) is making him bold.

Bold enough to keep it up once Jaehyun comes back?

He relents and leans back into the booth. Lets it lie where it is. Kevin cocks his head to the side, narrows his eyes. Chanhee doesn’t feel like talking about it anymore.

When Jaehyun comes back, he’s empty-handed. “Decided against it. Something I wanna do a little later and I figured, you know-”

“Some things go over a little better when you’re drunk, though,” Eric supplies helpfully.

Jaehyun smiles with his eyes and looks to Sangyeon, who just shrugs. “Eh, probably not this. Work stuff.”

“ _ God _ , you’re just like Chanhee,” Changmin whines. “Workaholic.”

Jaehyun catches Chanhee’s eyes across the table and says, “Not usually. I’ve just been kinda inspired recently.”

“You compose?” Kevin asks.

“Oh, no,” he smiles. “But, you know, music always takes a little inspiration.”

The table goes quiet. Most of them are able to hold back, but Younghoon sputters. Just loudly enough to make out over the bar buzz, he explains, “Sorry, that’s just… that’s a little cheesy.”

That breaks the ice and takes Haknyeon, Sunwoo, and Eric out. Jaehyun smiles, but his jaw is set at an angle and Chanhee can see his tongue pressed to his teeth. He hasn’t had anything to drink, but his cheeks glow pink in the low light. Embarrassed.

Cute.

Jacob redirects attention to his and Younghoon’s recent offer to do studio work on a film score, a long-time dream of his, and it’s easier to listen to than anything else so far. It’s well-mapped territory, the common ground they all share. Chanhee listens well without pretending. He doesn’t know whether Jaehyun does; he isn’t looking.

And then the conversation flows elsewhere (the new gaming console Eric just bought), and Chanhee’s focus disappears so entirely he can’t be sure it was ever there.

His mind wanders. Wanders to the concert, the hall, the ritual walk. To Jaehyun’s laugh, too abrasive and too good at making him cringe in his seat and smile behind his hand. He wonders if it would be better or worse to be able to pinpoint the exact moment he started to give in. Was it Eric? Kevin? Jaehyun? Or was it just Chanhee deciding to let go?

Has he let go?

“I’m gonna head home.” Juyeon’s the one who says it, but he’s just the first domino. It doesn’t take the others long to wrap up their conversations, finish their drinks. Before he knows what’s happening, he’s caught in a web of goodbyes and goodnights.

The group dwindles and dwindles until Sangyeon is packing Eric into the passenger seat of his car and Changmin is leaning down to drape himself over Chanhee’s shoulders in a poor approximation of a hug and buttoning Younghoon’s coat up to his ears for him.

Never the last to leave a party, Chanhee dismisses himself, figuring after the roommates but before Kevin isn’t a bad slot to occupy. “I’m heading out too,” he mutters, waving to the rest of the table. Leans down to Kevin and says, “Love you, nosy gossip. Get home safe, pease.”

Kevin waves him off and pretends to be offended, promises he’ll text once he’s home.

It’s clean, exactly to plan.

“I’m heading out too.”

A little less to plan.

“Actually, do you need a ride?”

Falling apart.

Kevin looks like a kid on Christmas, bobs his head as if to say ‘go on, answer him’.

He channels soft and apologetic when he answers Jaehyun. “Um, I actually took the train. I always do. So I don’t really need-”

“It’s no problem, really. If you’d prefer.”

“Uh, I-” He glances down the table, sees the rest of them performing overdone apathy. Thinks about walking through the halls with Jaehyun in suit and tie but acting like he could fit in anywhere. Thinks about taking himself home and staying upright just long enough to begin working through some new pieces.

“You drove?”

“Yeah. Was gonna leave it here and take the train if I needed to, but… you know, work.”

“Yeah, work.” It’s worse standing here in front of everyone. So he steels himself and nods. “Sure, I could use a ride. Thank you.”

He seems surprised for a moment, but it doesn’t take him long to recover. “Alright, cool.” Turns back to the table and waves. “See you guys tomorrow.”

The last thing Chanhee sees before pushing open the bar doors is Kevin’s smile. The wrong smile, he thinks. It should be smug and self-satisfied, the type he has on when he wins a game.

Now, he just looks happy. Purely happy.

“Uh, here, I’m parked over here,” Jaehyun guides, pointing to the side of the building. Chanhee follows him silently, crossing his arms against the wind.

Jaehyun starts toward the passenger side first and then doubles back. Grimaces, but he turns it into a smile. Chanhee’s already situated by the time he turns the key, and they haven’t said a thing.

He flexes his fingers in his lap, looks out the window. The bar is isolated from others of its kind in a calmer part of town, and it’s mostly empty this late. Nearly midnight now.

Feels like they’re the only ones.

“Where am I headed?”

It pulls him back and he shrinks in his seat, embarrassed. Embarrassed by nothing. “Um, north, I guess. If you just take this next-”

“Okay, yeah. I see,” he nods.

Maybe he should have had something to drink.

“You can put something on if you want,” Jaehyun offers. “I wasn’t listening to anything on the way, so-”

“I don’t really have anything.”

He nods, eyes trained straight ahead. Chanhee  _ definitely _ should have had something to drink.

“I like your jacket. Looks good.”

“Oh.” He can’t remember the last time he blushed at a compliment, and the darkness feels like God smiling down on him. Something to cover up. “Thanks. It’s new.” And he could leave it there, but he doesn’t want to. Anything is better than the silence. “I’m pretty into fashion, actually. One of the things I spend my time on outside of music.”

“That’s cool,” Jaehyun replies. It’s the sort of empty answer that should feel disingenuous, but it doesn’t. “I… well, I take direction,” he jokes. “I’ve looked good before, but usually it’s because someone else told me what to wear.”

“I think you look good now.”

“Thanks, I tried,” he says.

Chanhee doesn’t let himself think about why.

He directs him through the city quietly from the passenger seat, smiles when Jaehyun glances over at him bundled in his jacket and turns up the heat.

Chanhee likes looking out at the city. The colors are brighter at night and they blend together like a messy painting, something cathartic, something Kevin would take him to an exhibition to see. Not the sort of thing Chanhee would buy, but maybe the sort of thing he could make. That he’d like to make, eventually.

“Tired?” His voice is normally so loud, filling all the empty space, but now it’s quiet.

“Mmm, kinda. But I’m, uh, mostly just thinking.”

“What about?”

“Is it too cliché to say art?”

Jaehyun laughs at that. “Hmm, a fashionista violinist gazing out the window, musing about art. Doesn’t seem cliché at all,” he jokes.

“Did you just say the word ‘fashionista’?”

“What if I did?”

Chanhee laughs, easy and loud, the way Jaehyun does. “Then I would have to make fun of you and probably never talk to you about fashion again.”

“Well I don’t want that.”

And now the ball is rolling. Still leaning against the window, turned in so the glass chills the back of his head, he asks, “What  _ do _ you want?”

He barely even glances at Chanhee out of the corner of his eye before he realizes it isn’t rhetorical. Clears his throat and cuts to the chase. “Look, I know we don’t know much about each other yet, but I’m a little slow. I don’t know what you’re asking.”

“I mean,” he starts, leaning to rest his chin on his hand, “you’ve been… I don’t know, talking to me for a while. Now that we’re getting to know each other… what did you want? Talking to me?”

“Are you asking-”

“Like, did you always want to be friends? Or are you just one of those people who makes small talk?”

“I don’t make small talk.”

“I figured.”

His face shifts with thought (always so expressive) and Chanhee feels like he’s allowed to watch. Then, “You’re pretty. I didn’t really have a goal. Just wanted to talk to someone pretty.”

He isn’t sure what he had been expecting. Feels like he should pull back, tell Jaehyun that talking is all they’ll do, exchanging ‘hello’ and ‘doing fine’ in the dark for however long they share a stage. Ordinarily, that  _ is _ what he would do. But he doesn’t want to now.

“How’s it going so far?”

Chanhee’s glad Jaehyun is driving. He can watch him without having to be seen himself, makes every move easier.

“Well, you aren’t just pretty,” he laughs. “You’re good company.”

“You’re good company too.”

“I really didn’t think you’d think so.” It’s the type of thing others might say in self-deprecation, but Jaehyun’s just thinking out loud. His voice doesn’t waver and it doesn’t betray any disappointment.

“I do.”

Jaehyun swallows and raises his brows. Chanhee finds that, even when he isn’t speaking, it isn’t necessary to guess what he’s thinking.

They’re nearly to Chanhee’s building.

“Did you actually want to do work tonight?”

“I would have,” he answers, and Chanhee hears the implied ‘if’.

Jaehyun makes the final turn, finds a parking space. Turns to look at Chanhee and waits.

It feels so presumptuous and cold to say, but, “I’m not looking for a relationship.” Waits a moment and adds, “But you don’t have to go.” He isn’t sure what he’s doing, but it feels okay. He passes off the pace-setting to Jaehyun, lets him push it further.

He does.

He nods and says, “If- and I mean  _ if _ \- you want something, this can be whatever you want.” Leans into the center console.

Chanhee feels warmth blooming in his chest, pushes away thoughts of chairs on a stage and dingy bars and the emptiness of anything less than the best. Abandons velvet and gold for the thick glass and rough interior of Jaehyun’s car and leans in to meet him.

Jaehyun’s lips are chapped.

What  _ does _ he want this to be?

He likes the way Jaehyun’s body is so warm, the way he can feel that rare winter heat when he brings his hand up to cup Chanhee’s cheek. He likes the way Jaehyun leans in, crowds into his space a bit; not overwhelming, just more than he’s felt in a while. He likes the way Jaehyun kisses like how he plays.

Chanhee figures he wants it to be what he likes.

He figures he wants something to get swept up in, just for tonight.

Pulling away, relishing the way Jaehyun leans into the space he left, he murmurs, “Do you have anywhere else to be?”

“No.” Soft, breathless.

“Me neither.”

Jaehyun follows him up to his door, watches him fiddle with the lock. It doesn’t take them long once they’re in to pick up where they left off. He guides him through the entryway, doing all he can to ignore the way his stomach flips at the feeling of Jaehyun’s hand in his.

Tells himself that he of all people deserves one reckless night and pushes open the door to his bedroom.

Here, it’s all more real. Standing in his room is Jaehyun, the one from a few seats down, his friends’ favorite pick.

‘ _ Tension _ ’, they had said.

His hands itch to play, so he fists them in the front of Jaehyun’s shirt. He doesn’t have the neck of a violin, but he has the hollow behind the angle of Jaehyun’s jaw. It’s like practice in that the pain will come later, but it feels beautiful now.

One reckless night.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I wanted to say thank you for the support on the first chapter and for all the people who have decided to tune in as I publish this thing! I hope you get to eat your favorite snack soon, and remember my dog loves you :D


	3. Allentando

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Allentando - slowing down, used as a direction in music

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This has nothing to do with anything, but like, Maslow's hierarchy of needs but the whole thing just says 'tattoo'. Idk what to get though :/ but that's what's up with me today
> 
> Anyways, here's another little chapter! One of the scenes in this one was a favorite of mine to write, so I hope you enjoy reading!

He isn’t sure where Jaehyun got the paper for the note. He’s been meaning to get a new little legal pad for emergencies when he can’t use his phone for lists, but he hasn’t yet. He also isn’t sure why he’s worrying about the paper more than what’s on it.

‘ _ Didn’t want to overstay my welcome, but I had fun. See you tonight _ ’, signed not with a name but with a phone number. He hadn’t even had Jaehyun’s  _ number _ until now.

He had thought it might hurt. Might at least embarrass him. But as he shuffles around his apartment, fixing a meager breakfast and planning out his time until call at the concert hall for tonight’s performance, he feels okay. The only real low point of his morning is when he goes to brush his teeth and finds the toothbrush a little wet. He  _ knows _ it’s irrational, that they had gotten close enough last night that a toothbrush should be nothing, but he still has to force himself to use it.

Wishes he had that legal pad to make an official grocery list. Item number one: a new toothbrush. But he doesn’t, so he opens a new note in his phone hoping to have it deleted by the end of the day.

Sometimes Changmin texts him before lunch on these concert Saturdays and they meet up to eat together, but nothing comes in while he’s running through scales, so he figures his afternoon is wide open.

Obviously, as any young ‘rockstar’ (a joke Juyeon is still waiting on laughs from) would, he spends some of it at the drugstore down the street weighing the merits of different toothbrushes. Ends up settling on a cheap one with a blue plastic handle, easy enough to replace, just in case.

Just as he turns to leave the aisle and finish his ridiculously small errand, he gets an idea. Doesn’t think too much, just grabs another of the exact same toothbrush. A green handle this time so they don’t get mixed up.

“This it?” the woman at the register asks, sounding bored.

“Uh,” he starts, scanning the checkout aisle and adding a pack of gum. “Yeah, this is it.”

She rings him up without any further conversation and he’s out of the store in less than ten minutes (impressive time for a chronic overthinker). He idles on the street for a moment, toying with the idea of walking a few blocks and ducking into one of the cute coffee shops clustered near the park he visits on walks. It sounds nice, sounds like an afternoon well spent.

He bundles the toothbrushes and gum up in their plastic bag and tucks them into his coat pocket. He has time for an afternoon well spent.

~

“If you don’t leave me alone, I’m going to scream.”

“Wow, kinda dramatic, Chanhee.”

Truly, it wasn’t. Chanhee’s felt calmer today, thinks maybe he should treat himself to coffee and window shopping more often. He’s going through the regular script of annoyance layered over affection like mille-feuille that he always adopts when talking with Eric, but none of it has had the same bite as usual.

Eric has picked up on it, seems to realize that tonight is his best chance to push without the risk of Chanhee’s anger.

“Just tell me what happened, all Kev told me was that you guys left together,” he whines, hanging off the back of the folding chair Chanhee pulled up to start pre-performance maintenance. “Even if it’s just driving! I don’t care, I just wanna know.”

“You’re a nosy child.”

“ _ Yes _ , I am. So please share.”

“Why don’t you have anything better to do?”

“Because I’m already a prodigy, so I don’t need to practice or anyth- ouch!” he yelps, rubbing his arm where Chanhee flicked it.

“Fine,” he hisses. “But only if you’ll behave like a real adult for once.”

“Never,” Eric promises, pulling up his own chair far too close to Chanhee’s.

Rolling his eyes and fidgeting with the screw of his bow, he explains, “He offered to drive me home. We-” He hesitates. Keeps his eyes locked on the bow and prays Eric can’t see the blush on his cheeks. “We hooked up. And then he left.”

“You  _ hooked up with him _ ?”

He huffs and answers, “Yeah, so what?” He wishes Eric had an energy level lower than ten.

“It’s just weird. You did everything you could to avoid him not even two weeks ago, and now you’ve seen each other’s dicks. Chanhee,  _ I _ haven’t even seen your dick.”

“Wha- would you  _ like _ to?”

“Is that an offer?” he asks hysterically.

“ _ No _ , it’s not an offer! What the hell is wrong with you?”

Eric dodges Chanhee’s elbow and says, “Sorry! Just weird!”

“It’s not weird. It’s not even consequential. Basically nothing.”

“Alright, jeez,” he surrenders, hands up. “Fine.”

Chanhee finishes tightening his bow and waves him off. “Okay, I told you what happened. Now go annoy somebody else.”

“Have you told anyone else?”

“It’s not even worth telling people,” he shrugs. “A one-time thing because we were bored.”

Eric raises his eyebrows and fails at suppressing a smile.

“ _ What? _ ”

“You just… really don’t normally do stuff like that. Like, stupid stuff.”

_ Stupid stuff _ .

“Maybe I do. Maybe you just don’t know what I do,” he defends, nose turned up. “I’m serious, go make somebody else babysit you. No way is Juyeon doing anything important right now.”

Eric leaves laughing and lighthearted. Chanhee isn’t sure whether that’s how he wanted him to react or not.

He’s close with Jaehyun. For just a second, Chanhee wonders whether he should have asked him-

“Hey, yeah, good afternoon.”

A voice drifting in through the back door. Sort of abrasive in the few seconds of quiet that had settled after Eric’s departure, and Chanhee thinks he might be able to count down to the exact moment he’ll hear the tiny tap of a wooden case on the old cave floor. He isn’t sure who Jaehyun was greeting, just that it wasn’t him.

Every rational bit of him tells him there’s no reason to stick around, that he should go pray and check up on his shirt and tie in the mirror one last time.

But the rational bits of him have been losing recently.

He busies himself with collecting his music, scrolls through his phone. Maybe, if need be, he can use his camera to check his hair so he’ll never have to leave.

“Hey, Chanhee,” he says somewhere behind him. Probably coming back from the coat closet.

“Oh, hi.”

Jaehyun takes the seat Eric pulled up, drags it a few feet away before sitting. Makes sense for him to do that, to create some space. It makes sense.

“How’ve you been?”

Chanhee doesn’t try to reframe it as anything other than the idle conversations they’ve always shared. “Good. I had kind of a slow day today. Ran some errands.”

“Sounds boring.”

He never used to laugh during their small talk, but he does now. Already something different. Feels his chest opening up, feels himself relax in his seat. “A little bit. But some of it was nice. I went on a walk.”

“Ah, I love walks.”

“I know.”

Jaehyun glances up at him, hunched over his instrument. Smiles (Chanhee wishes he didn’t like the sight so much), and it feels new. A smile specifically for Chanhee, or specifically for being known. “I’m gonna go soon, I think. If you wanna come.”

He does.

“I’m actually… I have something I do-”

“Oh, right. Duh, you told me that,” he corrects. “The stairs to the balcony.”

It’s a gentle surprise, like finally reaching the part of the shore where the waves can lap at his feet. He’s never known Jaehyun before, never thought Jaehyun would ever stop pretending to know him.

But they’re really learning.

“It doesn’t take me too long. Maybe if you’re around there in… fifteen minutes? I could join then.”

“Okay,” he nods. “Got it. See you then.” He furrows his brows and salutes, ducks out of the room and leaves Chanhee alone with two older musicians he’s never personally spoken to past ‘good morning’ and ‘have a good night’.

Climbing the stairs to the point where they bend, hiding himself from the rest of the hall behind the rail and closing his eyes, he prays a little differently than he usually does. He starts with the classics, the ones he’s had memorized as long as he can remember, and tries to focus on the way they feel in his mouth. And then he folds himself lower in his kneel and silently asks for guidance.

He’s always told God his goals, always asked for strength when under pressure.

He thinks about these past few nights, coming home and pouring himself into bed instead of practice. Thinks about his parents encouraging him to channel his energy into his art, thinks about his friends having to drag him out to spend time together, and thinks he could stand to make more time for all of it.

This time, he doesn’t pray for extra time or energy or grace; he prays for the ability to see what he needs when he needs it, to make space for what he’s always wanted and devote himself to what will build him later.

He doesn’t pray for strength; he prays for clarity.

~

Chanhee had thought for just a moment standing there at the foot of the stairs that joining Jaehyun for his walk would be too hard. That maybe they didn’t really have anything in common except an instrument and one night of nothing better to do, that anything else is beyond them. Or beyond him.

But talking is easy.

Jaehyun loves Marvel movies. He has a sister who he grew up pranking (he swears he got good at running just from fleeing the scene of his worst ones). He didn’t always know that he wanted to play professionally; in school, he loved math, but he pretended he didn’t so he wouldn’t get picked on.

“I still like it. And I don’t really care about people knowing anymore.”

“Wow, you’re  _ so brave _ ,” Chanhee teases.

Jaehyun doesn’t retaliate, just throws back his head and laughs.

He listens to Chanhee talk about juggling odd jobs through school and asks about his tattoo. Laughs through the story of his attempt to ask a pretty girl to dance at his brother’s wedding and dragging his cousin to the bathroom so he wouldn’t have to cry alone when she said no (he had been a dramatic teenager, something he’s  _ definitely _ since gotten over).

Again, they walk until they’re out of time, this time even earlier than before since Jaehyun isn’t dressed and is much less adept at quick changes than Chanhee.

He isn’t in the market for a new velcro best friend, but Jaehyun’s always looked sort of pitiful after changing by himself at the hall, so he agrees to administer touch-ups. Even after their walk ends, they don’t separate.

He gets himself ready in record time and is leaning over the counter to examine his brows in the mirror when he sees Jaehyun clad in a shirt Chanhee knows wasn’t quite as wrinkled when he last saw it and with hair still unkempt from his beanie. He sighs and says, “Alright, let’s get to work.”

“You don’t have to make it sound like it’s gonna be a massive ordeal to get me looking presentable, you know.”

Maintaining his long-suffering air, he sweeps his arms out like tired wings and answers, “Some of us have it easy, Jaehyun. You’ll just take a little more work, it’s okay.” Beckoning him toward the counter, he adds, “Nothing to apologize for.”

Jaehyun bares his teeth at him, more funny than intimidating, but still comes without any further coaxing.

Looking at him up close, Chanhee becomes aware of a few things. One, he doesn’t have access to the sort of equipment he would need to get rid of all the creases in Jaehyun’s shirt; he’ll have to accept the loss. Two, the hair isn’t yet a lost cause; he’s almost certain he can fix it with just his hands.

And three, try as he might, he can’t make everything go back to the way it was before.

Before as in platitudes in the dim of the musicians’ entrance. Before as in his friends’ unfounded suspicion and Jaehyun across from him at a massive table in the corner of the bar. Before as in the second before he leaned over the center console of Jaehyun’s car in his building’s parking lot.

“Um, your shirt is-”

“Fine as is?”

“Beyond my capabilities at this moment,” he corrects.

“Doesn’t matter, most of the audience can’t see me anyway.”

Chanhee hadn’t thought of that. Hopes Jaehyun doesn’t dwell on it too often. “I can fix your hat hair, though.”

“Take it away,” he says, stepping closer.

Something changes when he’s around. Makes Chanhee wish prayers worked like magic. “Can I touch your hair?”

“Yeah, you can touch me.” It isn’t suggestive, but Chanhee almost wishes it was. That would be easier to process and ignore than the softness Jaehyun puts behind it.

His hair is soft, but of course Chanhee already knew that. It sticks out to the side near the front, sort of how Chanhee imagines it might look right after he wakes up. That, he doesn’t know for sure.

He wets his hands in the sink and starts working his fingers through, dutifully avoiding Jaehyun’s eyes. Feels like if he could talk, he could play it all off as playing hairdresser, turn this new thing on its head and model it after what they left behind.

“That feels nice,” Jaehyun mumbles. Chanhee glances down and notices his eyes have slipped shut. He looks relaxed.

“Trust me, my goal wasn’t to put you to sleep,” he jokes. “Concert soon. Taeyeon will have your head if you’re all sluggish.”

“Might be unavoidable.”

Chanhee focuses on his hair again but hums in question, hoping Jaehyun will keep filling the silence. Throws out, “Why’s that?”

He shrugs. “Just behind on sleep. Woke up pretty early this morning.”

Chanhee’s hands still in his hair for just a moment. He pulls away, turns to wet them again. It looks better now, just another moment and Jaehyun will be good to go.

He should let it go.

“I haven’t texted you yet, but I’m going to.”

He nods and Chanhee swears he sees his lips quirk up, if only for a second.

He really should let it go.

“It isn’t a big deal. Like, the whole thing is just no big deal, but did I do something that made you think you had to clear out before I woke up?”

Jaehyun huffs a laugh and asks, “Is that a joke?”

Ouch. “No, it’s a genuine question.”

He raises his brows and Chanhee feels his scalp move under his hands. “I mean, I just… got the impression that it was just…”

Chanhee pulls away and leans back against the counter, waits for him to continue. Easier to focus this way.

“Just a convenience thing? Not anything that you wanted to have to deal with after,” he finishes.

He tries to remember exactly what he told him in the car, whether he had really implied he didn’t want to ‘deal with’ him anymore. Maybe Eric is right about how he treats him.

“It-” he huffs, looking for the right words. Doesn’t want to give Jaehyun the wrong impression, but honesty doesn’t come quite as easily to him. “It  _ was _ about convenience, I think. But you’re a person. My friend, actually.” Jaehyun’s eyes widen again at that, big enough for Chanhee to see the lights reflected in them. “Your existence isn’t an inconvenience, you know.”

It’s the bare minimum, less than what Jaehyun deserves, what  _ anyone _ deserves. He isn’t usually like this.

“Yeah,” Jaehyun nods, antsy. “Honestly, I’m sure you already know that I’d like to do more than that. Than just exist to you, I mean.”

Like having a rug pulled out from under him, they’re straying. Chanhee needs to escape.

“Your hair’s done.”

“Thanks.”

“We should head out there.”

Jaehyun nods, follows him out. His face doesn’t betray anything, the worst time for it.

They part ways to finish their little final tasks. He takes his time and then finds his seat, glances down the row at Jaehyun in his own just once. Prepares his music, takes a breath. Hopes Jaehyun felt the same shock he did, the same tiny warning spark. Hopes he sees the live wire for what it is and leaves it alone.

Chanhee isn’t cold. He’s smart, he’s ambitious, he’s focused.

He’s obsessed, and it isn’t the curse his friends think it is.

Jaehyun didn’t have to leave this morning, but as long as Chanhee’s fading away, he makes a promise to the person he is when he comes back: tonight is for turning prayer into reality.

Jaehyun didn’t have to leave, but he isn’t coming back.

~

It’s been three hours. The clock’s been creeping towards 2 AM for what feels like a week, but everything before is a messy, ill-defined jumble of time. He can’t remember when he moved on from rehearsing for the new pieces Taeyeon’s planning to integrate two weeks from now and started sight-reading practice.

It all sounds like shit.

It gets worse with every passing second.

His head pounds and he’s positive his neighbors will kill him; they’ve had to endure for nearly forty minutes (two hours?), ever since the maintenance crew kicked him out of his practice room at the hall.

It had been nerve-wracking taking the train by himself so late, but he had made it. Dragged himself into his apartment on weary legs and dropped his coat at the door, unpacked his 909 and tried to tune with half-asleep ears.

The best won’t come without practice, though. It won’t come without the single-minded determination of all the greats, and it won’t come if he makes a habit of thinking of the way Jaehyun’s hips felt under his fingertips instead of the violin in his hands.

So his head hurts and his left arm has gone numb, and he still feels a bit too much like himself to be convinced he’s doing anything worthwhile. When it’s good, he’s transported.

Now, he’s just tired.

He wonders what Kevin would tell him, aggressive only in love. Or Juyeon, soft in his concern and delicate in all things. Or Jaehyun.

One more try, and he’ll sleep.

He’s alone in his living room, so no one calls his bluff.

~

The sun hasn’t risen yet when he wakes up. It’s still the dead of a particularly gray winter, so it doesn’t concern him too much. In fact, the only bad thing about it is the dull soreness of his eyes, mainly from a lack of sleep but made worse by the hours of sight-reading practice in the dark.

He has a text from Kevin asking whether he’d like to get brunch with a few of them that came in around midnight last night. Must have missed it in between leaving the hall and arriving home, the only time he might have thought to check his phone.

He thinks about it. Doesn’t really feel like he has the time… but that  _ is _ the goal. Find time for the things he’s been neglecting: his practice regimen and his friends. Types out a quick ‘yeah, sure’ and turns to set his phone on the nightstand. Remembers another text he was supposed to send.

The timeline is fuzzy in his mind. Which came first, his disregard of practice or his walk with Jaehyun? Did he first fixate on the place where Jaehyun’s starched collar meets his neck or abandon the idea of improvement for the idea of pleasure?

Will indulging one make the other worse?

Last night, he thought so.

He grabs an orange (horribly out of season) and gives himself a pass; a little extra time to think can’t hurt.

He whiles away an hour perfecting some of the more difficult fingering transitions in the season’s later repertoire. Feels something like the pure pride he used to get when he finally mastered a new piece, a feeling he remembers living off of his first few years with the violin. The sort of feeling that gets someone addicted.

It’s almost a shame to have to put it away to get ready for brunch. For one second, just a passing moment, he considers staying. He could text Kevin and tell him something has come up, and by the end of the day he could be so far ahead of the curve that he’d lose sight of where he started. It’s tempting.

Instead, he reminds himself what he asked for and pulls on an outfit he’s been excited to wear ever since the idea first came to him. Soft and pretty, making him look like he belongs in a garden somewhere. That’s as much a side of him as is his long brown trench and burgundy beret, the look of everyone in his department at school. They’re just different sides.

Everything he wears serves its own purpose. This softer feeling lets him float away on the idea of time spent in pleasure. If he wears it enough, maybe he’ll stop wanting the real thing.

~

He arrives early, but not early enough to beat Kevin. No one is ever early enough to beat Kevin. The restaurant hostess gestures to a table on her left, and Chanhee has to crane his neck to see him, he’s hunched so low in his chair.

“Morning,” he whispers, hands on Kevin’s shoulders.

He startles before realizing it’s Chanhee. Sighs and smiles lazily, says, “Good morning. I already ordered a little bit for the table-”

“Figured you would,” he nods and drapes his coat over the back of the chair. Kevin compliments it, asks if it’s new. Chanhee knows he isn’t actually deeply interested in his clothes, but he’s kind enough to humor him. Still, he lets him off the hook without much struggle. “Who all’s coming?”

“I was wondering when you’d ask. That’s always your first question.”

It’s a fair question; brunch is a common ritual, but the cast is always changing. “I’m naturally curious,” he defends with a smile.

“Just a couple of us. Don’t worry, no Jaehyun. He hasn’t been initiated yet.” Chanhee tries to maintain his vaguely interested air, pretending Jaehyun is still just another name. “Younghoon and Changmin. I’m not sure about Sangyeon. He never responded.”

“Probably too busy doing straight people bullshit.”

Kevin’s eyebrows draw together in comic shock and he laughs, “Chanhee, he is  _ not _ straight.”

This is news to him. “What do you mean? Of course he is.”

Smothering a laugh, Kevin says, “Dude, I don’t know what to tell you. Gaydar broken, in need of repair.”

“If Sangyeon is gay, then I’m straight.”

“He literally dated a guy for like half a year a while ago.”

“No way.”

“No way what?”

Speak of the devil and he shall appear.

“You’re gay?” Chanhee asks, hopes his disbelief doesn’t offend.

Sangyeon laughs and says, “I play the flute, like, as my job. Wait, are  _ you _ gay?”

Now  _ that _ is offensive. “Of course I’m gay! I thought we were all gay.”

“Not all,” he argues. “Remember that girl Hak dated for a while? And Jacob’s just been freestyling for as long as I’ve known him-”

“Not gay as in homosexual, gay as in not straight. As in one of the precious few acceptable subsets of the human population.”

“Okay, sorry,” he apologizes, hands up and smile wide. “I guess I just don’t like to assume.”

“Well  _ I _ like to assume,” Kevin says, nodding aggressively. “Like, for example, I know he’s still a little new to me so I don’t know him super well, but Jaehyun is definitely into guys. I’m assuming. I could make assumptions about everyone-”

“Jaehyun likes guys,” Chanhee confirms.

Usually once Kevin’s started down a path he’s excited about (like now, harmless queer gossip), it’s hard to derail him, but he’s quiet in an instant. Interested. “Do you have receipts?”

And Chanhee hesitates. They haven’t discussed it yet, really. In the moment and every time they’ve talked after, it’s been clear it wasn’t anything big. Just once, nothing behind it. But Chanhee has no way of knowing whether Jaehyun’s okay with anyone  _ else _ knowing. In fact, he can’t quite remember anything Jaehyun has said that might have indicated to the ones he’s less close with in any concrete way that he’s even queer, and Chanhee may have just outed him-

“He told me about a date he went on once,” Sangyeon supplies, completely oblivious to Chanhee’s spiraling. “I think it was with a guy.”

He looks at Kevin and nods. “Yeah, I think he told me about the same one.”

It’s a lie. Jaehyun’s only told him about one date so far and only ever called them ‘they’. Chanhee isn’t sure what Sangyeon’s talking about, but he isn’t about to deliberately draw the focus of anything Jaehyun-related back to himself.

“It’s good that y’all are getting along better now,” Kevin muses. “Not that Jaehyun was ever bad to you before.” His face is smug.

Sure. Chanhee can work with it. “Yeah, okay, fine. He’s a good guy, I guess. Never said he wasn’t, but okay.”

“Eric’s been hanging out with him for a while, so I was pretty sure he’d at least be fun.”

Kevin isn’t wrong; Jaehyun is fun. But the implication makes him laugh. “As if Eric is the end all be all of character judgment. Remember when he brought that pamphlet to rehearsal and we had to get Jacob to explain to him that he was being recruited to a cult?”

Despite Kevin’s better effort, he cracks a smile. “Okay, yeah, that was bad. But he was right about this one.” Before Chanhee can interrupt and steer the conversation somewhere less conducive to picking on his Jaehyun complex, Kevin gets mischief in his eye and adds, “By the way, nice of him to offer you a ride. How did that go?” Now, he knows exactly what he’s doing.

Sangyeon seems lost, watching the two of them talk like a tennis fan, eyes darting from Kevin’s prompting gaze to Chanhee’s gritted teeth and back again. He sighs, never dropping his tight smile, and answers, “Went fine. Why do you insist on making me talk about him?”

Kevin’s face falls in a second, and Chanhee regrets saying it. It isn’t even a big deal, and he tries to tell him as much. Kevin waves it off though, says, “No, you’re right. You… you know, you clearly don’t wanna.”

_ I just can’t, and I can’t tell you why. _

“I just have more important things to focus on.”

This is where Sangyeon regains his footing, able to contribute to a conversation about music. “Ah, yeah, repertoire this season is… well I actually don’t know what it’s like for first violin. But there’s some challenging work for me.”

“I haven’t been practicing as much as I’d like to recently,” Chanhee says as the first of what Kevin ordered arrives. “But I think I’ll get a lot done today and tomorrow and be in a good spot for Tuesday’s rehearsal.”

“Just don’t work yourself to death,” Kevin reminds him, pouring himself some orange juice from the pitcher the waiter brought.

Chanhee nods absentmindedly. It’s like whiplash, the feeling of switching from a topic laden with so much baggage to the taste of fresh orange juice on a morning he had planned on spending alone. Something about it feels like home, though. Not the home he grew up in, but the one he’s created.

For one, it’s this restaurant. The first time they tried it, Chanhee had been less than enthused about the quaint ‘family style’ set-up. But with each visit, it became more familiar, and soon he couldn’t remember why he had liked their previous usual place so much. This place is as much his kitchen table as is the one in his apartment.

It’s also the scene. Kevin pouring them all glasses of juice from a pitcher they’ve definitely been served with before, Sangyeon buttering a slice of bread Chanhee knows was baked fresh this morning. Changmin and Younghoon arrive just before Kevin orders their usual quiche, one of the big ones they always swear they won’t polish off but never leave any leftovers of, and it completes the tableau.

Even with the odd rough patches, Chanhee’s glad he decided to make time.

“So,” Kevin starts after Changmin’s finished complaining about how Younghoon is always out practicing with Jacob around dinner time now and Younghoon’s tried to defend himself (Chanhee understands, but it’s too much fun antagonizing him). “Not to derail the mood or anything, but…”

He looks around and waits. Changmin nods, prompts, “Go on. What is it?”

His lips stretch to a tight line, and he taps on the side of his glass. “I, um, well Chanhee knows everything. The rest of you, you know about Beom-”

“Horrible asshole man who we hate?” Changmin asks.

Kevin smiles, weaker than when he had smiled at their jokes and stories earlier. “I filed a complaint a bit ago. Hadn’t heard any sort of follow-up until yesterday. Taeyeon emailed and asked whether I’d be comfortable meeting with her and the executive director to discuss.”

“Oh, wow,” Sangyeon mutters. Chanhee’s thoughts exactly.

As delicately as he can, he asks, “Do you want to? Is that really necessary?”

“I’ve never done anything like this before,” he shrugs.

Chanhee isn’t sure whether he should, but it doesn’t matter. Younghoon beats him to it and asks, “Are you gonna?”

“I mean… I want something to change. Yeah, I’m gonna do it.”

“Okay,” Chanhee nods, reaching for Kevin’s hand, waiting for him to take it. “Remember what I said earlier, okay? Behind you one hundred percent.”

“I don’t know exactly what Chanhee said, but me too,” Changmin agrees. Sangyeon and Younghoon nod and Chanhee squeezes Kevin’s hand.

“Thanks,” he smiles. “That’s it. Just, you know, a status update. Soon, it’ll all be over.”

Chanhee hopes it’s true.

Soon enough, Younghoon has redirected them to talking about a series of youtube videos he found that he’s going to use to learn to bake bread. Changmin is particularly excited about it ( _ “I get free rein, roommate privilege.” _ ), and unlike Changmin’s other non-musical interests, Chanhee can also get behind this one. In a perfect world, he would spend more time eating fresh bread.

They eat and talk and laugh. Younghoon compliments his outfit too, and he’s always been closer in mind to Chanhee on fashion than Kevin has, so they break off to talk about it for a while. It’s easy. It’s nice. It’s time away from his instrument, but that was the plan.

When he gets home, he’ll work, but not the point of exhaustion. He promises himself that. He’ll have a good day, and he won’t dip into his energy for tomorrow.

Sustainability, just like his friends have been begging of him.

~

In his good mood on the way home, he had decided to text Jaehyun. Just to give him his number, exactly as he had promised. He sends something quick, changes his clothes, and decides to pick up where he left off.

It isn’t the abandon he chases sometimes, the floating feeling of being more music than person. It’s just practice. And when he gets tired, he stops.

He’s been trying to break the habit lately, but as long as Kevin insists that his usual practice schedule itself is going to kill him one day, checking his phone as soon as he sets his instrument down isn’t his  _ worst _ habit. And this time, there’s actually something there.

_ Hey chanhee _

Simple, almost utilitarian. Just enough to let him know the text went through.

As hypocritical as it makes him feel, he’s disappointed. But what could he have expected?

Maybe the same as always: too much.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I hope you find a new song that blows your mind today, one of those ones where you're like "okay so this is my whole personality for a little while" ^-^ and as always, remember my dog loves you!!

**Author's Note:**

> This is an exciting piece for me, kind of unlike things I've done before, so I hope you enjoy! Have a great day and always remember my dog loves you <3


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